According to the article, it says as long as you don't turn on automatic updates, it won't update to IE7. Personally I use SeaMonkey myself. No where near as lightweight as Firefox probably but it works extremely well.
Local IT divisions will always exist for a few good reasons:
1. As much as remote access is convenient, people still have a love and preference to socialize with people. After all that's what makes us human. Besides, my experience in support is that personally being there and helping out is far better than trying to give out instructions over the phone. It also takes a bit of the mystery out of what you actually do for management.
2. External Contractors don't always care about your company's well being. They'll do the bare minimal to ensure they can get more work out of you in the future. Local IT staff (at least good IT) tend to prefer to get everything working perfectly because that means less work for them or time to work on more interesting things. There's a joke that good administrators tend to look like they're doing nothing which has more truth to it than you would think.
3. Many companies use customized systems and configurations that benefit from someone being locally there and experienced. Centralized systems tend not be as loved due to the fact that staff can quickly run into limitations.
Sadly it isn't quality that consumers go for. It's features. The reason why DVD was successful over VHS was that it was a technically more durable and easy to use format that VHS. DVD featured surround sound for the first time, allowed you to skip to different chapters and seek faster plus it was a HUGE quality jump from the old and lasted longer under heavy use. Plus it was spiffy little disk that took less shelf space.
The only gain I see in Blue-Ray or HD-DVD formats is for keeping a large series to one disk instead of a set of DVDs. Aside from that I have the inconvenience of needing to buy an entire new system and set of disks to use it. Plus it isn't easily ripped if you need it for something else.
You only need to look at mp3s versus CDs to realize that people value features and convenience over quality.
Plus with the rising use of high speed broadband, I'm beginning to find that a lot of friends are more willing to pirate movies and shows over the Internet instead of shelling out $30 for a disk with the exception of movies or shows that they really love.
Funny that you would refer to the interface as Fisher Price looking but the reality is for a lot of techies that buy it is that it is an inexpensive / mod-able toy that may eventually find some good use. After all why risk messing up your high end laptop / desktop unit when you can get a device that is designed to be messed around with and is inexpensive in case you do manage to break it. Just look at the Linksys NSLU2 for example. As a product it's nearly completely useless as a NAS. Load on the modified firmware that lets you run Debian on it thou or OpenSlug and presto, you have a Linux server that has a 4 watt power use profile that's pretty hard to beat for price too.
Nice try Netgear, this company http://www.qnap.com/ already has some of the fastest Linux ARM based routers on the market. Tom's hardware recently reviewed their TS-209 Pro series which ranked as one of the fastest NAS's they've ever used. It also supports a huge variety of OSs and is probably closer to a micro server than a NAS.
I suspect there's some other motive to this other than just powering a small island. One could say attach a high powered laser system to it or the military could use it to power some of their remote equipment in places where it isn't easy to drag a generator along. Otherwise I don't see this as being very cost effective.
I'll admit it's more popular then when I first saw it years ago but it's hardly mainstream. It's still a very tiny market. Most anime series are still spread by word of mouth or by fansubs. After all I run an anime club and I don't even know what's new all the time. There's no direct advertising from Japan concerning the latest anime's out in public media. The little direct advertising that I do see is from an ancient anime series. At the moment, the system is working best for producers and consumers. While I suspect producers are a little nervous about it. The way I see it is torrenting is like radio. You get to watch for free and then decide if you like it enough to buy.
It's interesting that so many folks don't understand what anime is. I've helped run a club for nearly a decade so what I can tell you and why it's loved has more to do with it's format I suspect. I prefer to call them anime series because most series are about 12-26 episodes long. Imagine going to watch a good movie and having it last for 12-26 episodes. It's why I like anime, they can go far more in depth than a good movie plus they cover topics that would give our censoring groups a heart attack. Some views on religion or god for example are interesting. Also there's a massive variety. Imagine the variety that a movie rental has. That's the diversity that anime has. Plus if you find something you like, you'll have a good 12-26 episode series versus only 2 hours of fun.
I find it sad that most folks still consider anime as being for kids only. That's as bad as saying Movies are for kids only. Or video games are only for kids. They arn't.
As for why torrenting is popular. Anime has an interesting distribution style which is something the North American companies should study. Originally when I first joined anime years ago it was tough to find it. Now you can find nearly anything licensed or unlicensed online. While the general idea is that once a North American company licenses it, the torrenting is suppose to stop it doesn't. Halariously most copyright holders don't entirely care. That's because they don't have to spend a cent on advertising and a series gets popular by it's own credits. Fans then go out and buy the overpriced series they like. So there you have it, it's all online for you to pick and choose and if you really like it you can shell out your hard earned cash. I guess in a sense this means that fans end up paying for the pirating but hell, if you really love a series don't you want more people to see it? Win-win for both consumer and producer I say. ISPs of course lose on this the most due to all the torrent traffic.
Company parties often make stressed and overwhelmed employees feel appreciated and improves the overall attitudes at an organization. I would say chances are your organization has low morale if you don't at least all celebrate now and then in some form or another. That said, what's missing in this article is how many people attend. If it's one of the tiny parties we're normally use to then sure a million seems like too much but if it's for a large organization like NASA then I wouldn't be surprised if that works out to be a resonable amount. Parties arn't cheap if a large number of folks attend.
If my wallet slips out of my pocket with all my ID and has $10 in it, is it morally right for you to take the money if you find it? Now granted it is my fault for loosing my wallet in the first place but I highly doubt taking the cash is the right thing to do. You are essentially taking advantage of someone else's mistake. That's wrong.
If you believe that wireless should be secure then go ahead, knock on their door and warn them of a problem. If they're stupid enough to say they don't mind you using their network then you've got yourself a free pass to it.
Personally I think this one's tough to enforce thou and it should probably be just a fine unless something more serious happens. My thoughts on folks who argue it is their right to take advantage of others just want to keep their "free" Internet.
If you ask me this is a pretty weak marketing ploy. Consider a few things. First off any console with Internet access could do this. Distributed computing is more about numbers than about individual machines being more powerful. Secondly, basically you're donating power and possibly the lifespan of your system away. What Sony's done is give you a convenient way to donate. If you really cared about cancer research then donate some real money to a Cancer charity. I'm sure some folks will do it but it kind of defeats the purpose of what the PS3 was meant for, a gaming unit.
I remember when I first tried out Gnome under Debian, the install was a nightmare. Some configuration GUI features were broken and I wasn't sure what all the packages were that I needed. KDE was just a question of gettting all the packages and installing them and then you're done. My friends at first didn't agree with me until they tried using Gnome and KDE as windows managers on Sparcs. The result... Well after a HUGE series of headaches due to things breaking and malfunctioning under Gnome on the Suns they switched to KDE and never looked back. I'm not saying you can't get Gnome working. It's just that it seems to need more work!
Wow, I actually tried out that autostitch program. It works extremely well. For carefully shot pictures, it will stitch more or less perfectly. For wrecklessly shot, less than perfect but much better than what I can do with Canon photostitch. Considering it was automatically stitching stuff better than what I was doing with Canon photostitch with a lot of manual tweaking, it's impressive. I hope this guy's development work becomes a commercial product.
Actually a good example of video that is heavily Internet distributed is actually Anime. It's widely shared in file distribution systems and most folks who are big anime fans are also big downloaders. So does that mean DVDs are doomed? Not really! Most big Anime fans actually still buy the ultra-expensive DVD sets of their favourite series. It often comes with a very nice looking box and the quality is much higher than mpeg4 clips you can download. Unless broadband speeds allow you to somehow download 8Gb of data (which is about the size of dual layer DVD) in a matter of minutes, I seriously doubt DVD as a format will be in trouble anytime soon. Another importent point is that we're able to detect visual compression easier than we can detect audiable compression. This is partly due to the fact that most of us downloading will be using our computers to watch video and computer monitors completely destroy TVs when it comes to image quality. I'll bet that mp3s wouldn't be as popular if by default we used high end sound systems on all our PCs. By default we have high end video systems on our PCs.
Err, I'm not sure if the costs can be accurately compared in this way. One needs to remember that a cluster of separate computers acting as a supercomputer compared to a custom designed hardwired system isn't exactly the same thing! Otherwise you can start comparing stuff like SETI which I'm sure is the world's cheapest supercomputer because it technically didn't cost anything to SETI themselves.
AMD Cool'n'Quiet makes the Athlon64 special
on
AMD 90nm Evaluated
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· Score: 1
It's funny that this has been one of the most overlooked features of the Athlon64 for thoes of us that don't max-out their CPU load all the time. The 754 & 939 socket CPUs have a neat technology called AMD Cool'n'Quiet which basically ramps the CPU voltage and frequency up and down depending on load when properly setup. I have an Athlon64 3200+ socket 754 which normally runs at 2Ghz but idles at 800mhz. The result? I've seen halariously my passive cooled motherboard chipset a degree hotter than my cpu (and yes this is stock heatsink that AMD provides with it's boxed CPUs). If you think that's funny I've actually disabled my CPU fan to see if the system could possibly idle without it. It passed that test with flying colours (under 40C) (thou I doubt that'd be a bright idea with load) This will be awesome for non-intensive load users because the reality is most web-surfing / e-mail and casual use rarely causes the CPU to break 800mhz for very long. The result is power savings and cooler systems. Socket 940's unfortunately don't support this feature. From everything I've read, it has something to do with the use of registered DDR ram. (It appearently can't take the frequency shifting abuse as well)
I've used both PalmOS devices and PocketPC devices and I would have to say that PalmOS stuff is better designed, better supported and more effecient. While this may put PocketPCs on the top hardware-wise, it still doesn't beat a PalmOS device when it comes to it's native OS and general usability.
I suspect this will be a big win for Nintendo. It has the right features and the wireless ability sounds very innovative for a portable system. Personally I've found portable units nice even thou I own a PC and several console units. They're there when you want to play almost anywhere! (Washroom, Train, Bus, Subway) Compared to console and PC units which are fixed. Sadly, I find for a busy person like myself, I get more time into a GBA SP since it's always there compared to my PC or Consoles for gaming!
I think a lot of folks are forgetting that the problem doesn't lie in the sound cards. It's the speakers. I own a Sound Blaster Audigy card which supports 5.1 sound and EAX which is about all you need for most modern games. While I could get a more powerful sound card, realisticly with my speakers I probably couldn't really tell the difference. I have a four point sound setup which is okay. The thing is a matching set of speakers to take advantage of your sound board is usually 10x more expensive than the card itself. Now considering the fact most consumers have el cheapo speakers that are even worse than mine, it's not surprising they don't care that much since a $100 or less creative card will in thoes regards be overkill already.
I've actually done this before. Thanks to my affinity with an Anime club, we had access to University theater projection equipment. Car racing type games were breathtaking since the cars were pretty much life sized! The only games that didn't work too well were side scrolling space shooters where there were lots of objects to track on screen. They're difficult because it takes longer for your eyes to track the whole field of view on a big screen killing your reaction time. Aside from that it was a lot of fun. I think if theaters decide to do this, it will be loads of fun!:)
www.vosonic.com
These digital wallets are very nice if you need a flash card reader plus a digital wallet for digital photography. Space is a question of how large a laptop HD your want to put in the thing. They feature an internal Lithium Ion battery as well.:)
I dunno about the rest of us but personally, I think it'd be better to carry a specialized device for playing games like a GameBoy Advance SP rather than try to game on a cellphone. While small / cute cellphone games are understandable, I think we'll see a lot of folks with RSI injuries on a cellphone if we start getting games like that since cellphones arn't designed for gaming. Otherwise we'll get funny comments like "I broke my hand / cellphone playing a game!"
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According to the article, it says as long as you don't turn on automatic updates, it won't update to IE7. Personally I use SeaMonkey myself. No where near as lightweight as Firefox probably but it works extremely well.
Local IT divisions will always exist for a few good reasons:
1. As much as remote access is convenient, people still have a love and preference to socialize with people. After all that's what makes us human. Besides, my experience in support is that personally being there and helping out is far better than trying to give out instructions over the phone. It also takes a bit of the mystery out of what you actually do for management.
2. External Contractors don't always care about your company's well being. They'll do the bare minimal to ensure they can get more work out of you in the future. Local IT staff (at least good IT) tend to prefer to get everything working perfectly because that means less work for them or time to work on more interesting things. There's a joke that good administrators tend to look like they're doing nothing which has more truth to it than you would think.
3. Many companies use customized systems and configurations that benefit from someone being locally there and experienced. Centralized systems tend not be as loved due to the fact that staff can quickly run into limitations.
Sadly it isn't quality that consumers go for. It's features. The reason why DVD was successful over VHS was that it was a technically more durable and easy to use format that VHS. DVD featured surround sound for the first time, allowed you to skip to different chapters and seek faster plus it was a HUGE quality jump from the old and lasted longer under heavy use. Plus it was spiffy little disk that took less shelf space.
The only gain I see in Blue-Ray or HD-DVD formats is for keeping a large series to one disk instead of a set of DVDs. Aside from that I have the inconvenience of needing to buy an entire new system and set of disks to use it. Plus it isn't easily ripped if you need it for something else.
You only need to look at mp3s versus CDs to realize that people value features and convenience over quality.
Plus with the rising use of high speed broadband, I'm beginning to find that a lot of friends are more willing to pirate movies and shows over the Internet instead of shelling out $30 for a disk with the exception of movies or shows that they really love.
Funny that you would refer to the interface as Fisher Price looking but the reality is for a lot of techies that buy it is that it is an inexpensive / mod-able toy that may eventually find some good use. After all why risk messing up your high end laptop / desktop unit when you can get a device that is designed to be messed around with and is inexpensive in case you do manage to break it. Just look at the Linksys NSLU2 for example. As a product it's nearly completely useless as a NAS. Load on the modified firmware that lets you run Debian on it thou or OpenSlug and presto, you have a Linux server that has a 4 watt power use profile that's pretty hard to beat for price too.
Oops, typo! I meant NAS not router. Oh well. :p
Nice try Netgear, this company http://www.qnap.com/ already has some of the fastest Linux ARM based routers on the market. Tom's hardware recently reviewed their TS-209 Pro series which ranked as one of the fastest NAS's they've ever used. It also supports a huge variety of OSs and is probably closer to a micro server than a NAS.
Last I recall Titanium isn't very reactive so when you lick it, it shouldn't taste like metal.
I suspect there's some other motive to this other than just powering a small island. One could say attach a high powered laser system to it or the military could use it to power some of their remote equipment in places where it isn't easy to drag a generator along. Otherwise I don't see this as being very cost effective.
Let's hope that Scientist doesn't do research on computers. Otherwise I'd say you wouldn't want him or her. ;)
I'll admit it's more popular then when I first saw it years ago but it's hardly mainstream. It's still a very tiny market. Most anime series are still spread by word of mouth or by fansubs. After all I run an anime club and I don't even know what's new all the time. There's no direct advertising from Japan concerning the latest anime's out in public media. The little direct advertising that I do see is from an ancient anime series. At the moment, the system is working best for producers and consumers. While I suspect producers are a little nervous about it. The way I see it is torrenting is like radio. You get to watch for free and then decide if you like it enough to buy.
It's interesting that so many folks don't understand what anime is. I've helped run a club for nearly a decade so what I can tell you and why it's loved has more to do with it's format I suspect. I prefer to call them anime series because most series are about 12-26 episodes long. Imagine going to watch a good movie and having it last for 12-26 episodes. It's why I like anime, they can go far more in depth than a good movie plus they cover topics that would give our censoring groups a heart attack. Some views on religion or god for example are interesting. Also there's a massive variety. Imagine the variety that a movie rental has. That's the diversity that anime has. Plus if you find something you like, you'll have a good 12-26 episode series versus only 2 hours of fun.
I find it sad that most folks still consider anime as being for kids only. That's as bad as saying Movies are for kids only. Or video games are only for kids. They arn't.
As for why torrenting is popular. Anime has an interesting distribution style which is something the North American companies should study. Originally when I first joined anime years ago it was tough to find it. Now you can find nearly anything licensed or unlicensed online. While the general idea is that once a North American company licenses it, the torrenting is suppose to stop it doesn't. Halariously most copyright holders don't entirely care. That's because they don't have to spend a cent on advertising and a series gets popular by it's own credits. Fans then go out and buy the overpriced series they like. So there you have it, it's all online for you to pick and choose and if you really like it you can shell out your hard earned cash. I guess in a sense this means that fans end up paying for the pirating but hell, if you really love a series don't you want more people to see it? Win-win for both consumer and producer I say. ISPs of course lose on this the most due to all the torrent traffic.
Company parties often make stressed and overwhelmed employees feel appreciated and improves the overall attitudes at an organization. I would say chances are your organization has low morale if you don't at least all celebrate now and then in some form or another. That said, what's missing in this article is how many people attend. If it's one of the tiny parties we're normally use to then sure a million seems like too much but if it's for a large organization like NASA then I wouldn't be surprised if that works out to be a resonable amount. Parties arn't cheap if a large number of folks attend.
If my wallet slips out of my pocket with all my ID and has $10 in it, is it morally right for you to take the money if you find it? Now granted it is my fault for loosing my wallet in the first place but I highly doubt taking the cash is the right thing to do. You are essentially taking advantage of someone else's mistake. That's wrong. If you believe that wireless should be secure then go ahead, knock on their door and warn them of a problem. If they're stupid enough to say they don't mind you using their network then you've got yourself a free pass to it. Personally I think this one's tough to enforce thou and it should probably be just a fine unless something more serious happens. My thoughts on folks who argue it is their right to take advantage of others just want to keep their "free" Internet.
If you ask me this is a pretty weak marketing ploy. Consider a few things. First off any console with Internet access could do this. Distributed computing is more about numbers than about individual machines being more powerful. Secondly, basically you're donating power and possibly the lifespan of your system away. What Sony's done is give you a convenient way to donate. If you really cared about cancer research then donate some real money to a Cancer charity. I'm sure some folks will do it but it kind of defeats the purpose of what the PS3 was meant for, a gaming unit.
I remember when I first tried out Gnome under Debian, the install was a nightmare. Some configuration GUI features were broken and I wasn't sure what all the packages were that I needed. KDE was just a question of gettting all the packages and installing them and then you're done. My friends at first didn't agree with me until they tried using Gnome and KDE as windows managers on Sparcs. The result... Well after a HUGE series of headaches due to things breaking and malfunctioning under Gnome on the Suns they switched to KDE and never looked back. I'm not saying you can't get Gnome working. It's just that it seems to need more work!
Wow, I actually tried out that autostitch program. It works extremely well. For carefully shot pictures, it will stitch more or less perfectly. For wrecklessly shot, less than perfect but much better than what I can do with Canon photostitch. Considering it was automatically stitching stuff better than what I was doing with Canon photostitch with a lot of manual tweaking, it's impressive. I hope this guy's development work becomes a commercial product.
Actually a good example of video that is heavily Internet distributed is actually Anime. It's widely shared in file distribution systems and most folks who are big anime fans are also big downloaders. So does that mean DVDs are doomed? Not really! Most big Anime fans actually still buy the ultra-expensive DVD sets of their favourite series. It often comes with a very nice looking box and the quality is much higher than mpeg4 clips you can download. Unless broadband speeds allow you to somehow download 8Gb of data (which is about the size of dual layer DVD) in a matter of minutes, I seriously doubt DVD as a format will be in trouble anytime soon. Another importent point is that we're able to detect visual compression easier than we can detect audiable compression. This is partly due to the fact that most of us downloading will be using our computers to watch video and computer monitors completely destroy TVs when it comes to image quality. I'll bet that mp3s wouldn't be as popular if by default we used high end sound systems on all our PCs. By default we have high end video systems on our PCs.
Err, I'm not sure if the costs can be accurately compared in this way. One needs to remember that a cluster of separate computers acting as a supercomputer compared to a custom designed hardwired system isn't exactly the same thing! Otherwise you can start comparing stuff like SETI which I'm sure is the world's cheapest supercomputer because it technically didn't cost anything to SETI themselves.
It's funny that this has been one of the most overlooked features of the Athlon64 for thoes of us that don't max-out their CPU load all the time. The 754 & 939 socket CPUs have a neat technology called AMD Cool'n'Quiet which basically ramps the CPU voltage and frequency up and down depending on load when properly setup. I have an Athlon64 3200+ socket 754 which normally runs at 2Ghz but idles at 800mhz. The result? I've seen halariously my passive cooled motherboard chipset a degree hotter than my cpu (and yes this is stock heatsink that AMD provides with it's boxed CPUs). If you think that's funny I've actually disabled my CPU fan to see if the system could possibly idle without it. It passed that test with flying colours (under 40C) (thou I doubt that'd be a bright idea with load) This will be awesome for non-intensive load users because the reality is most web-surfing / e-mail and casual use rarely causes the CPU to break 800mhz for very long. The result is power savings and cooler systems. Socket 940's unfortunately don't support this feature. From everything I've read, it has something to do with the use of registered DDR ram. (It appearently can't take the frequency shifting abuse as well)
I've used both PalmOS devices and PocketPC devices and I would have to say that PalmOS stuff is better designed, better supported and more effecient. While this may put PocketPCs on the top hardware-wise, it still doesn't beat a PalmOS device when it comes to it's native OS and general usability.
I suspect this will be a big win for Nintendo. It has the right features and the wireless ability sounds very innovative for a portable system. Personally I've found portable units nice even thou I own a PC and several console units. They're there when you want to play almost anywhere! (Washroom, Train, Bus, Subway) Compared to console and PC units which are fixed. Sadly, I find for a busy person like myself, I get more time into a GBA SP since it's always there compared to my PC or Consoles for gaming!
I think a lot of folks are forgetting that the problem doesn't lie in the sound cards. It's the speakers. I own a Sound Blaster Audigy card which supports 5.1 sound and EAX which is about all you need for most modern games. While I could get a more powerful sound card, realisticly with my speakers I probably couldn't really tell the difference. I have a four point sound setup which is okay. The thing is a matching set of speakers to take advantage of your sound board is usually 10x more expensive than the card itself. Now considering the fact most consumers have el cheapo speakers that are even worse than mine, it's not surprising they don't care that much since a $100 or less creative card will in thoes regards be overkill already.
I've actually done this before. Thanks to my affinity with an Anime club, we had access to University theater projection equipment. Car racing type games were breathtaking since the cars were pretty much life sized! The only games that didn't work too well were side scrolling space shooters where there were lots of objects to track on screen. They're difficult because it takes longer for your eyes to track the whole field of view on a big screen killing your reaction time. Aside from that it was a lot of fun. I think if theaters decide to do this, it will be loads of fun! :)
www.vosonic.com These digital wallets are very nice if you need a flash card reader plus a digital wallet for digital photography. Space is a question of how large a laptop HD your want to put in the thing. They feature an internal Lithium Ion battery as well. :)
I dunno about the rest of us but personally, I think it'd be better to carry a specialized device for playing games like a GameBoy Advance SP rather than try to game on a cellphone. While small / cute cellphone games are understandable, I think we'll see a lot of folks with RSI injuries on a cellphone if we start getting games like that since cellphones arn't designed for gaming. Otherwise we'll get funny comments like "I broke my hand / cellphone playing a game!"